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A Descriptive Analysis of Active Shooter Events: 2000-2010 First Name / Last Name, Department of Criminal Justice - Texas State University Active Shooter Event Criteria • An active shooter event involves one or more persons engaged in killing or attempting to kill multiple people in an area occupied by multiple unrelated individuals. • At least one of the victims must be unrelated to the shooter • The shooting must not be a by-product of an attempt to commit another crime. • Even though gang-related shootings match the definition, they are excluded because law enforcement does not consider these an active shooter event. • Domestic murders are not included, unless the shooter was in public and continued shooting unrelated individuals (Blair, 2011) Notable Active Shooter Events • August 1, 1966 – A shooter opened fire from the 27th floor of the University of Texas Bell Tower. The shooter killed 16 and wounded 31 in approximately an hour and a half. • October 16, 1991 – A shooter drove through a window at a Luby’s cafeteria in Killeen, TX. The shooter killed 23 and wounded 27 before three police officers stopped him 10 minutes later. • April 20, 1999 – Two high-school seniors executed a well-planned attack on Columbine High School. The shooters killed 13, injured 21, and committed suicide in 47 minutes. • April 16, 2007 – A senior at Virginia Tech University chained the doors of Norris Hall and systematically killed 32 and wounded 17 over the course of 10 minutes before committing suicide. • July 22, 2011 – A shooter attacked a youth camp located on an island in Norway. The shooter killed 69 on the island over the course of about 45 minutes before being stopped by law enforcement Evolution of Law Enforcement Tactics • Prior to The University of Texas Shooting of 1966 – Law enforcement was without tactical units and training to handle such events. After this, and other national events, law enforcement developed SWAT teams. Now, law enforcement would set a perimeter and wait on SWAT to stop an event. • After the Columbine Shooting of 1999 – Law enforcement no longer sets a perimeter and waits on SWAT. Now, patrol officers are trained to form a response team, enter the event, and eliminate the threat without waiting on SWAT. Evolution of Law Enforcement Tactics (cont.) Descriptive Analysis Descriptive Analysis (cont.) • Presently – The law enforcement community is evaluating if training officers to enter events solo is advantageous over forming a response team. Possible Disadvantages of Solo Entry • The solo officer has limited firepower • The solo officer has to cover more fields of fire • The solo officer lacks the physical and psychological support of a team Recent Attempts to Catalog Events Secret Service, FBI, & DOE (2010) • Focused on violence at Institutes of Higher Education • Age distribution is bimodal Number of victims shot in Active Shooter Events: By location and most powerful weapon • Included all types of violence not just shootings Location Pistol School 224 Office 49 Factory/Warehouse 12 Public 42 Military Base 43 Church 8 Retail 37 Other 4 *Percentages in parentheses • Limited to schools…did not include other locations (Drysdale et al., 2010) NYPD (2011) • Did include all locations in analysis instead of just schools. • Used weak criteria to include events in study. Variables • Relationship between shooter and victims. Coded as employee, student, or no relation. • How the shooter was stopped. Coded as subdued, shot by police/citizen, arrested later, surrendered, or suicide. • Location of Event. Coded as public, factory/warehouse, school, office, retail, military base, or church. • Mobility. Coded as either mobile or non-mobile. • Weaponry. Broken down by the most powerful weapon used: pistol, rifle, shotgun, or unknown. • Explosives. Coded as either present or not present. • Body armor. Coded as either present or not present. (74) (63) (21) (35) (77) (24) (39) (9) Rifle 27 (09) 9 (11) 14 (24) 20 (17) --9 (26) 40 (43) 11 (24) Shotgun 33 (11) 6 (08) 14 (24) 6 (05) --17 (50) 9 (10) --- Unknown 18 (06) 14 (18) 18 (31) 52 (43) 13 (23) --7 (08) 41 (67) No of Victims 303 78 58 119 56 34 93 46 Key Findings Sample & Measures Selection of Events (n=120) • Lexis-Nexis was utilized as the primary search engine • Search terms included: school shooting, office shooting, mall shooting, and so on. • Terms were coupled with month and year to be more thorough (e.g., office shooting January 2000, office shooting February 2000, etc.). Cross Tabulation • Active Shooter Events are not isolated to specific locations • Ninety-four percent (n=113) of shooters are male • A single shooter is responsible for 97.5 (n=117) percent of events • The shooter is non-mobile in 85 (n=102) percent of event • There is no relationship between shooter and victims in 53 percent (n=64) of events • Sixteen of the 44 (36 percent) school shooters were orchestrated by adults (i.e., >25 years of age) Future Research • Official police reports need to be examined to remove the unknown variables. • Solo vs. Active Shooter Team needs to be examined further • Medical response during events needs to be examined • Law enforcement officers intervene in only 27 percent of the events. If “Suicide After Police” is included as an intervention the total is 39 percent. • Thirty-seven percent of the time suicide is the outcome Contact information First Name / Last Name Department of Criminal Justice Texas State University 601 University Dr. San Marcos, TX, 78666 E-mail: [email protected]